Woody Allen

Birth name Allan Stewart KönigsbergNationalityUSABirth 1 december 1935 (83 years) at New York City (USA)Awards Academy Award for Best Director, Writers Guild of America Award

Heywood "Woody" Allen (born Allan Stewart Konigsberg, December 1, 1935) is an American actor, writer, director, comedian and playwright, whose career spans more than 50 years.
He worked as a comedy writer in the 1950s, writing jokes and scripts for television and publishing several books of short humor pieces. In the early 1960s, Allen began performing as a stand-up comedian, emphasizing monologues rather than traditional jokes. As a comedian, he developed the persona of an insecure, intellectual, fretful nebbish, which he maintains is quite different from his real-life personality. In 2004, Comedy Central ranked Allen in fourth place on a list of the 100 greatest stand-up comedians, while a UK survey ranked Allen as the third greatest comedian.

By the mid-1960s Allen was writing and directing films, first specializing in slapstick comedies before moving into dramatic material influenced by European art cinema during the 1970s, and alternating between comedies and dramas to the present. He is often identified as part of the New Hollywood wave of filmmakers of the mid-1960s to late 1970s. Allen often stars in his films, typically in the persona he developed as a standup. Some best-known of his over 40 films are Annie Hall (1977), Manhattan (1979), Hannah and Her Sisters (1986), and Midnight in Paris (2011). Critic Roger Ebert described Allen as "a treasure of the cinema."

Allen has been nominated 24 times and won four Academy Awards: three for Best Original Screenplay and one for Best Director (Annie Hall). He has more screenwriting Academy Award nominations than any other writer, and has won nine British Academy of Film and Television Arts Awards. Allen performs regularly as a jazz clarinetist at small venues in Manhattan. In 2011, PBS televised the film biography, Woody Allen: A Documentary, on the American Masters TV series.

Biography

Marriages and romantic relationships
Allen has had three wives: Harlene Rosen (1954–1959), Louise Lasser (1966–1970) and Soon-Yi Previn (1997–present). Though he had a 12-year romantic relationship with actress Mia Farrow, the two never married. Allen also had romantic relationships with Stacey Nelkin and Diane Keaton.

Harlene Rosen
At age 19, Allen married 16-year-old Harlene Rosen. The marriage lasted from 1954 to 1959. Time stated that the years were "nettling" and "unsettling."

Rosen, whom Allen referred to in his standup act as "the Dread Mrs. Allen", sued him for defamation due to comments at a TV appearance shortly after their divorce. Allen tells a different story on his mid-1960s standup album Standup Comic. In his act, Allen said that Rosen sued him because of a joke he made in an interview. Rosen had been sexually assaulted outside her apartment and according to Allen, the newspapers reported that she "had been violated". In the interview, Allen said, "Knowing my ex-wife, it probably wasn't a moving violation." In an interview on The Dick Cavett Show, Allen brought up the incident again where he repeated his comments and stated that the sum for which he was sued was "$1 million."

Louise Lasser
Allen married Louise Lasser in 1966. They divorced in 1970, and Allen did not marry again until 1997. Lasser appeared in three Allen films shortly after the divorce – Take the Money and Run, Bananas, and Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex* (*But Were Afraid to Ask) and later briefly appeared in Stardust Memories.

Diane Keaton
In 1970, Allen cast Diane Keaton in his Broadway show, Play It Again, Sam. During the run she and Allen became romantically involved and although they broke up after a year, she continued to star in a number of his films, including Sleeper as a futuristic poet and Love and Death as a composite character based on the novels of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky. Annie Hall was very important in Allen and Keaton's careers. It is said that the role was written for her, as Diane Keaton's given name is Diane Hall. She then starred in Interiors as a poet, followed by Manhattan. In 1987, she had a cameo as a nightclub singer in Radio Days, and was chosen to replace Mia Farrow in the co-starring role for Manhattan Murder Mystery after Allen and Farrow began having troubles with their personal and working relationship while making this film. Keaton has not worked with Allen since Manhattan Murder Mystery. Since the end of their romantic relationship, Keaton and Allen remain close friends.

Stacey Nelkin and Mariel Hemingway
The film Manhattan is said by the Los Angeles Times to be widely known to have been based on his romantic relationship with actress Stacey Nelkin. Her bit part in Annie Hall ended up on the cutting room floor, and their relationship, though never publicly acknowledged by Allen, reportedly began when she was 17, and a student at New York's Stuyvesant High School.

In her memoir Out Came The Sun: Overcoming The Legacy of Mental Illness, Addiction and Suicide in My Family (2015), Mariel Hemingway alleged that Allen had a crush on her at the time Manhattan (1979) was in production and shortly afterwards wanted their platonic relationship to turn into something more. Hemingway was then 17 or 18 and Allen in his mid-40s. Allen suggested they holiday in Paris together, but without saying they would share a bedroom. Hemingway's parents are said to have gently encouraged the liaison, but Hemingway herself writes that she finally resisted Allen's approaches.

Mia Farrow
Around 1980, Allen began a ten-year relationship with actress Mia Farrow, who starred in 13 of his films from 1982 to 1992. They never married or lived together, but lived near one another on opposite sides of Central Park in Manhattan.

In December 1991, after 10 years together, Allen formally adopted two of Farrow's own previously adopted children, Dylan, 7, and Moses, 13. Farrow told the court that Allen was an “excellent father,” although the children lived with her. The New York Times wrote that Allen and Farrow "are constantly in touch with each other, and not many fathers spend as much time with their children as Allen does." He tried to be with them every day.

The following month, January 1992, Farrow was at Allen's home and came across nude photos of her other adopted daughter, 21-year-old Soon-Yi Previn, which were taken by Allen. As a result, Farrow realized that Allen was having an affair with Soon-Yi. This caused a bitter breakup of the long-term relationship between Allen and Farrow, with Soon-Yi then moving in with Allen. In her autobiography, What Falls Away, Farrow says that Allen admitted to the relationship with Soon-Yi.

Soon-Yi Previn

Soon-Yi Previn was the adopted daughter of Farrow and her former husband, composer André Previn. Soon-Yi, who was born in Korea, was a child when her mother abandoned her by leaving her on a street in the slums of Seoul. Farrow adopted her at age seven.

Because Allen and Farrow had never married, Allen was not Previn's legal stepfather. After his relationship with Mia Farrow ended acrimoniously in 1992, Allen and Previn continued their relationship and she moved in with Allen. They married in 1997 and have two adopted daughters.

Children
Allen and Mia Farrow, though unmarried, jointly adopted two children, Dylan Farrow (who changed her name to Eliza and later to Malone) and Moshe Farrow (known as Moses); they also had one biological child, Satchel Farrow (known as Ronan). Ronan's paternity came into question, however, after Farrow claimed in 2013 that he might in fact be the biological child of Frank Sinatra, her first husband, with whom she "never really split up," she said. Allen did not adopt any of Farrow's other children, including Soon-Yi.

Following Allen's separation from Farrow, and after a bitter custody battle, she won custody of their children. Allen was denied visitation rights with Malone and could see Ronan only under supervision. Moses, who was then 15, chose not to see Allen but by age 36 he had become estranged from his mother and reestablished his relationship with Allen and his sister. Farrow tried to have Allen's two adoptions with her nullified, but the court decided in Allen's favor and he continues to be their legal father.

Allegations of child sexual abuse
Allen and Farrow engaged in a heated and emotionally damaging custody battle after they broke up in January 1992. That August, Allen visited his children at Farrow's home while she went shopping so they wouldn't have to see one another. Farrow later accused him of having molested their 7 year-old daughter, Dylan, during that visit, and filed charges with the police. Dylan said that the abuse took place in the attic. However, Moses Farrow, Dylan's older brother, then 15, said there were several people present in the house during Allen's entire visit and "no one, not my father or sister, was off in any private spaces".

The case was dropped in 1993 after a seven-month probe by a police-appointed medical team concluded that Dylan had not been molested. Among the reasons cited for the team's conclusion were the contradictory statements made by Dylan and that her statements had a "rehearsed quality." The judge eventually found that the sex abuse charges were inconclusive. In addition, investigators with the New York Department of Social Services closed their own 14-month investigation after their similar conclusion, that "No credible evidence was found that the child named in this report has been abused or maltreated." Allen was interviewed by 60 Minutes a few months following the allegations, when he described the custody battle, heated exchanges, and the allegations.

In February 2014, Dylan Farrow repeated the allegations in an open letter published by Nicholas Kristof, a friend of Farrow, in his New York Times blog. Allen again repeated his denial of the allegations, calling them "untrue and disgraceful", and followed with his own response in The New York Times. Dylan's brother, Moses, currently a family therapist, told People magazine, "Of course Woody did not molest my sister... She loved him and looked forward to seeing him when he would visit." He said that their mother had manipulated her children into hating Allen as "a vengeful way to pay him back for falling in love with Soon-Yi." Dylan has denied that she was ever coached by her mother and has stood by her allegations.

Psychoanalysis
Allen spent over 37 years undergoing psychoanalysis, and some of his films, such as Annie Hall, jokingly include references to psychoanalysis. Moment Magazine says, "It drove his self-absorbed work." Allen biographer John Baxter, wrote, "Allen obviously found analysis stimulating, even exciting." Allen says his psychoanalysis ended around the time he began his relationship with Previn, although he is still claustrophobic and agoraphobic.